


ontology

by ethandiesofdysentery



Category: Video Blogging RPF
Genre: Crack Treated Seriously, M/M, Magical Realism, Metafiction, dream team, i guess, i spose?, idk how to tag ill get back to you on that, so im in this fandom now huh
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-03-15
Updated: 2021-03-16
Packaged: 2021-03-24 02:28:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,064
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30065283
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ethandiesofdysentery/pseuds/ethandiesofdysentery
Summary: Ontology is the branch of philosophy that studies concepts such as existence, being, becoming, and reality.-or-In which there are technical difficulties, George thinks this is Jumanji, Sapnap's bet is on the Matrix, and Antfrost becomes a detective.
Relationships: Clay | Dream/GeorgeNotFound (Video Blogging RPF)
Comments: 7
Kudos: 6





	1. Prologue (Everything in MODeration)

**Author's Note:**

> on this episode of griffin ethandiesofdysentery is in another fandom now,
> 
> anyways. i have read zero mcyt fic. i am going in blind. i have been watching dream team content for abt 3 weeks. and i can't get this idea out of my head.
> 
> it is time to die
> 
> (anyways for those of u who dont know me hi im griff i write wild ass crack fics for various rpf fandoms. i live here now. accept me, mcyt fandom. pblease.)

When you're trying to coordinate recording with four other people, shit's bound to go wrong. But the technical difficulties are particularly obnoxious this time.

First Bad's computer decided to run an update with no warning. Then Dream and Sapnap's internet went down. And then as soon as that was fixed, Ant's power went out for two seconds, which was long enough to crash his entire setup. Then Dream and Sapnap's internet again. Then Bad's mic stopped working for five minutes. 

(Throughout all this, George was perfectly, and in everyone else's opinion, obnoxiously, unaffected.)

The whole thing kind of felt like the universe was trying to derail this video, Dream thinks but doesn't say. It's tentatively named "Minecraft, But We Don't Know What Mod We Downloaded", and he'd gotten the whole manhunt crew together for it. It had been a lot of work, between coordinating the recording, debating how to randomly pick a mod, and now all these technical issues, and he's not about to let it go to shit now.

But now, after an unnecessary amount of hours (read: more than one), everyone seems to be up and running. Everyone runs through an obligatory checklist to make sure everything is _really_ working this time, and then Dream loads the server. At the same time, everyone else logs on. The server loads.

And then Ant's game crashes.

"Guys, hang on, I'm offline again," he says, groaning as he reopens Minecraft. They'd gotten so close this time, damn it. 

No one answers.

"I'm reloading the game," he continues, watching as his computer seems to make a point of opening the game as slowly as possible. And there's still no response.

Ant switches screens, assuming the call has crashed as well. It hasn't. Then he assumes everyone else ended up muted. They haven't. He's looking at four unmuted callers, remaining absolutely silent. 

"Not funny, guys," he goes on, tapping his fingers nervously against his desk. It doesn't make sense. Even if they hadn't heard him say his game crashed, everyone would still be yelling at each other over something or other. It's what they do. It's part of the fun. But the call remains absolutely silent.

Ant is starting to think this might not be a joke.

\---

The server loads. In one house, Ant's game crashes. In three others, the inhabitants black out.

\---

Dream wakes up on the ground, eyes squeezed shut against the sunlight. A slight breeze passes over him. He thinks he might hear cows in the distance. He shifts position, and finds that he's crushing grass beneath him. Underneath the natural ambiance, there's a barely noticeable strain of piano. To summarize: What the _fuck_?

Last he remembers, he was in his room, getting ready to play Minecraft with his friends. Then...nothing. But something must have happened in that span of nothing, because this is _not_ his room.

He blinks his eyes open, throwing an arm over them when he realizes he's staring straight into the sun. After a moment, his eyes adjust, and he pulls his arm away to find himself looking at the sun again. It's high in the sky, bright as all hell, and _fucking square_.

Dream proceeds to list off every swear in his vocabulary, and then some. Behind him, a half-awake voice yells, " _Language!_ "

Last he remembers, he was in his room, getting ready to play Minecraft with his friends. It seems like he's doing that after all.


	2. Minecraft, But We're In It

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The gang plays Minecraft. George and Sapnap make analogies. Dream has a troubling realization.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sfkjlksdf thank u for the support on the prologue!! ily mcyt fandom ur so nice. anyways i am starting writing this on a bus to school bc we start back in person today so. let's hope i dont fuckin die i guess bc then ill never finish this!
> 
> UPDATE: im writing this after having finished it, on the same bus but in the opposite direction. the driver hasnt driven this route in two years and she brushed against the railing on a goddamn bridge. if i die then this will be my legacy. oh god.
> 
> this felt a lil rambly as i was writing it but im ok with how it turned out! i am a funny author who is funny
> 
> enjoy!! love yall!!

Dream sits bolt upright and takes a look at his surroundings. They're extremely familiar in the most unfamiliar way. He's sitting on grass, yeah, but it's flat and pixelated. (Despite that, when he touches it, it feels damn well like normal grass would, which definitely isn't disconcerting at _all_.) A square sun shines in the sky. Blocky trees are off to his left. To his right, an equally cubic desert.

It's goddamn Minecraft.

Dream pushes himself to his feet, relieved to find that when he looks down, he's pushing against the ground with a normal human hand and not a pixelated rectangle. That being said, his normal human hand is wearing black fingerless gloves that he definitely didn't pass out in. He inspects himself, noting that the t-shirt and sweatpants combo he'd been in before has been replaced by jeans and a painfully green hoodie - an outfit that he's worn, like, once in real life, but seen in many a piece of fanart. He instinctively grabs at his face, and finds that his hand hits a smooth, hard, indeterminate material. He traces the circular shape, then shoves his hand under the mask just to make sure there's a normal human face under it. Thank fuck, there is. (It's kinda weird he can see through the mask perfectly fine, but hey, he's inside a fucking video game. There are no rules anymore, apparently.)

Dream turns around, eyes travelling all around him, trying to spot anything that would indicate that he's having, like, a really bad drug trip or something. He doesn't find any of that. What he does find is another person, running towards him, in yet another outfit that he's only ever seen in fan creations.

"Hi, what the fuck," George greets him casually, pushing white sunglasses onto the top of his head. He slows as he gets within a few feet of Dream - not that Dream's sure how normal units of measurement apply in this scenario. Dream can't figure out what the hell to say to that, so he settles for breaking down into hysterical laughter. " _What_?" George says, watching his friend double over for no apparent reason.

"You look fuckin' _ridiculous_ ," Dream responds through waning chuckles. It's not that the outfit is that weird on its own, but when you're having a nervous breakdown and your buddy suddenly looks like he's cosplaying himself, anything can look insane.

"Not as ridiculous as you," George replies without missing a beat. "Can you even _see_ through that thing?" He gestures to Dream's mask. 

"Yes I can fuckin' see through 'this thing'," Dream responds, rolling his eyes even though he's aware George can't see him do it through the mask in question. "Can _you_ see through _those_ things?" he asks, pointing at the sunglasses on George's head that, honestly, do look a little dumb in real life. Well, okay, as close to real life as they could be in this situation.

"They're _sunglasses_ , Dream," George says. "You're wearing a sheet of plastic on your face."

Dream snorts, about to come up with some super cool and funny comeback, he's sure, but he's interrupted by a full-on _shriek_ from somewhere to his left.

He and George simultaneously look towards the noise and find Sapnap on his feet, looking around him frantically. After seemingly deciding that this isn't providing any good information, he looks down at himself instead. "Oh my _god_ , I look like an _idiot_!" he screams, as if that's the biggest problem here. 

"Well, at least _he's_ self-aware," George comments, deadpan, getting a snort out of Dream in response. And, yeah, Sapnap is definitely worst off in the department of "having an outfit that looked cool as a Minecraft skin but ridiculous as hell on an actual person". 

Sapnap's head snaps up at George's voice, though he doesn't seem to have heard exactly what George had said - that, or he's still too shellshocked to care.

"Oh, shit, you guys are in my fever dream too," Sapnap comments, nodding as if to confirm this to himself. "Cool."

George and Dream share a look, as if double-checking with each other that this _isn't_ maybe just a fever dream, and after a moment they seem to come to a consensus.

"Not a dream," George reports back to Sapnap with what seems to be a grim expression. "Unfortunately."

Sapnap begins to point at himself, and then Dream, and then George, repeatedly, muttering what seem to be numbers under his breath. Finally, he offers, "There's three of us."

George nods slowly with all the restraint of a patient teacher explaining to a toddler why we can't throw Mikey off the swing set, even if it's for fun. "Yes, Sapnap. Good job. You can count to three."

Sapnap takes a break from being in shock to glare daggers at him. "Shut up, George. What I mean is, there _were_ five of us. If we're all here...where are Ant and Bad?"

Dream takes a turn at being part of the conversation. "I heard Bad somewhere earlier. Hang on." He cups both hands around his mouth and yells at the sky, "FUUUUUUUCK." Right on cue, a pained, "LAN _GUAGE_!" come from somewhere behind him. "Found him," he informs Sapnap and George, satisfied with his efforts.

The crew turn in near-unison and move towards the voice at various paces, ranging from a jog (George) to a near-sprint (Dream) to a begrudging walk (Sapnap). Dream reaches the sound of the voice first, finding Bad where he had previously been hidden from view behind a hill, leaning against the side of a grass block and looking like he's still half-asleep. Not that it's that easy to tell, because at the present moment, Bad pretty much looks like a human-shaped shadow in a hoodie. Dream looks around at his other friends, cataloguing their appearances and outfits, and thinks something along the lines of, _Yeah, that tracks._

Bad stares up at the trio with white orbs that are kinda probably like eyes in some way, shape, or form, managing to look clearly confused despite the complete lack of what would be considered "a normal amount of facial features". He takes a moment to look around him, taking in all the details of the very obviously virtual world, and then looks back up at his three friends standing in front of him. After an extended period of consideration, he finally says, "Well, we're inside Minecraft."

Everyone else nods as if they hadn't already realized this. They aren't about to call Bad out on being a bit of a Captain Obvious. They can't yell at _Bad_.

Finally, Sapnap steps forward and offers his hand, which Bad accepts, and with Sapnap's help, he gets to his feet. Once he's up, his eyes trail on his hand for a moment, inspecting it like he had everything else, and after another moment of consideration, this time he settles on reacting with a casual, "Huh." He looks up at the others and shrugs. "Kinda cool, honestly." 

Sapnap snorts. Dream tries not to lose it laughing. George is very clearly holding back some choice words that he would have said to anyone else in the group if _they_ had been the ones to suggest that whatever the hell is going on could possibly be, in any way, _cool_. Bad is too busy spinning in a circle, looking over everything again and again and again to notice. After taking this last moment to reflect on the situation, he finally says, "Okay. But how do we get out?"

"Thank you!" Sapnap says, throwing his arms toward Bad as if saying, _Hey, look, finally, a competent person!_

"Also, how did we get _in_? And where's Ant? Has anyone seen Ant?" Bad locks eyes with everyone else, and continues, panicked, "Who's gonna take care of our _pets_?" As the questions devolve into frantic rambling, Sapnap's "competent person" look is slowly draining away. Before everyone in this group self-explodes, Dream clears his throat.

"Okay," he says once he's gotten everyone's attention. Despite the panic that's started to edge its way up his throat in conjunction with the realization that this is _actually_ happening, he doesn't find it all that hard to fall into the role of the leader. "I haven't seen Ant, and we found the rest of each other pretty quick, so maybe he isn't here?" Everyone begins to nod. Okay, good. That's one item checked off. "Okay. So let's agree to assume that Ant isn't in here with us. Why are _we_ here?"

He's met with dead silence. 

"Anyone?" he tries again, hoping that at least one person will offer even the dumbest suggestion. They don't. "Okay," he finally relents. "Then let's focus on getting _out_."

George's hand shoots up in the air. Sapnap snorts.

"This isn't middle school, Gogy. You don't need to raise your hand," he says, earning a stuck-out tongue from George, which definitely for sure solidifies the concept of this not being middle school.

" _Well_ ," George says, lowering his hand indignantly. "I bet it's like Jumanji. If we win the game, maybe we get to leave it."

Dream starts to nod in response, but he's interrupted by Sapnap asserting, "No, no, it's more like the Matrix. 'Cuz it's digital, right?"

"Then what do you suggest? We fuckin' - sorry Bad - we freakin' unplug ourselves or something?" George responds. 

"It's not a _board game_."

"The new Jumanji movies, Sapnap! They're _literally_ stuck in a video game!"

"Well, I haven't seen those, so I still think it's more like the Matrix."

"But that has nothing to do with-"

"Shut UP!"

Everyone goes dead silent, heads swiveling to find that, shockingly, the command had come from Bad, who's tensed up, fists balled at his side. He takes a deep breath and loosens up. " _Thank_ you. Anyways. I think George is right." George pumps his fist. "I bet it is like Jumanji. We just have to beat the game."

"We _just_ have to beat the game," Dream echoes. Bad makes it sound so simple. Dream's beaten Minecraft enough damn times to know it's nothing he's ever wanted to actually-in-person-physically do. Judging from the looks on George and Sapnap's faces, they're thinking pretty much the same thing.

Bad shrugs, not catching on to the vibe. "I mean, yeah. We've all done it before. What makes this any different?"

"What makes it different is if we die we might not come _back_!" Dream blurts out before he's even had time to realize he's said it. It shuts everyone else the hell up. Dream absentmindedly notes that the sun has continued further down in the sky. 

"Then," George speaks up, deathly serious, "we just have to not die."

Even though they don't say anything aloud, everyone seems to understand perfectly well what's just been said. And that right now, saying more would be a really stupid idea.

Bad clears his throat. "Well, it's just like a speedrun then, right? I'll...get wood?" He gestures vaguely towards the forest in the near distance, obviously unsure of how the mechanics of "punching a tree until the log just kinda pops out" will function in this situation. Dream has no goddamn idea either. Once again, a silent consensus is reached, and Bad nods and heads off in the direction of the trees. 

The remaining players stand in a loose circle for a moment, awkwardly sharing glances with each other. George in particular seems very interested in looking at Dream with deadly intensity. Finally, he clears his throat and almost imperceptibly smirks in the way that says, _It's mood lightening time, motherfuckers._

"Dirty blonde my ass," he says, which is so far from the realm of what Dream expected to come from his mouth that he almost goes back into shock.

"Sorry, what?" he says, because that's all his mental faculties are providing him right now. 

"You said you were dirty blonde," George elaborates, gesturing vaguely at Dream's head. "But you're _definitely_ just plain blonde." After no one says anything, he continues, "I mean, if that is what your real hair looks like."

Dream's hand jumps up to his head and knots into his hair, which does in fact feel to be the right length and level of waviness to be his "real hair", as George put it. Sapnap unhelpfully offers, "Yeah, it definitely is." It only takes him a split second to notice how tense Dream has gotten and connect the same dots his friend already has.

It's at this moment that Deus Ex Badboyhalo comes to the rescue, yelling, "Hey, guys, I got wood!" from somewhere in the general area of where one would assume wood would be acquired. Everyone's gazes swerve to see Bad gesturing triumphantly at a blocky tree that's missing a middle section. Sapnap gives Dream a _hang on buddy, I got you_ sort of look, and turns to George. "Hey, you wanna go help Johnny Appleseed over there?"

"Didn't Johnny Appleseed _plant_ trees?" George asks, but Sapnap is already shoving him out of the clearing they're in and towards the forest. George gives a noncommittal shrug and goes along with it, transferring Sapnap's momentum into a jog of his own. Once he's sufficiently out of earshot, Sapnap turns to Dream, concerned.

"Okay, spill," he says, as if he doesn't know what Dream is going to say.

"If it's my actual _hair_..." he begins, trailing off before he can finish the sentence, but it's okay, because Sapnap already knows the rest.

"Show me," he says, gesturing upwards with one hand. After making absolutely sure that Bad and George - _especially George_ \- are still off in the distance, and he's facing away from them, he lifts up the mask. Sapnap just nods. 

"Yeah, that's your face," he says. He doesn't seem particularly bothered by that, but he also seems to have the cognizance to know Dream _is_.

And to know _why_. 

Dream nearly slams the mask back down over his face and clears his throat. "Okay. Um, okay." 

"Clay," Sapnap says, officially departing Cool Gaming Buddies territory for Serious Close Friend Talk territory, "in case you have noticed, we are _inside Minecraft_. No one is gonna care."

Dream doesn't need to speak for Sapnap to get what's coming next - that's the brilliance of longtime friends. _But I care._

Dream is a little scared that they're about to have a real "emotional heart to heart" sort of situation here, but once again Bad comes to his rescue.

"Hey, get over here and help, you muffinheads! We got the whole _tree_!" he yells, accompanied by a boastful, "Yeah!" from George.

Sapnap gives Dream a look that manages to say, within one second, _this is not over but we are now going to help our friends physically beat up some birch trees so we can escape the video game we are currently trapped in_. Dream nods, even though he doesn't really agree with that first bit.

And then they head for the forest.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hey gang! thanks for reading!! make sure to drop a kudos and a comment, your support is absolutely what keeps me writing!! please dont expect the next chapter to be this long ill do my best but i fucken WENT OFF on this one fsdkljfslkj
> 
> love yall! have a nice day! <3

**Author's Note:**

> oh wow isn't that wild!!!1!1!!!!1!
> 
> anyways hello mcyt fandom if u enjoy this u should leave kudos and a comment to tell me so i have motivation to get to the actual Story part of the story!! can u imagine?? am i right my fellow writers
> 
> also u shld check out my youtube channel!!!! im an animator and im very smart and funny. sub 2 clouttail 2k21
> 
> that's all pls enjoy my creation. thanks for reading i love u


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